What would "Out of Africa" if shot by Wes Anderson, along with a bipartite alibi borrowed after Murnau's "Taboo", look like? It would like this film.
The quirkiness of the band intruding cinematically here and there on the second part, along with the use of music or the charming, fleeting delineation of the animal profiles on the clouds, testify to Gomes following the steps of Anderson; to what purpose or tenor, apart from some kind of academic camp ("her harmless, soft bipolar disorder" snaps when heard), or the occasional charm (I especially, really liked and appreciated the "monkey business" dream early on the film but the film fails to deliver after the double-entendres implied there), I can not tell. It just feels random rather improvisatory and the cinematography, its posing and sequences, if it scores once, then misfires thrice.
I am also someone that finds voice-over the easy way out, unless when used in manner like say Godard or Marker does, and that means part of the stroke, rather than part of a misty crutch. (When at the end we learn that there in Mario's murder lies the beginning of the war, the film, being overall finicky, cannot have this as camp or sly, but is actually rather lame - those who swoon in a post-post-colonialist way or whatever are out of their depths.)
Carlotto Cotta was by far the most powerful presence in the film his cheeky, soulful and sexy gaze anchor the film whenever he is on screen, yet he can not possibly structure the affair, a really missed one.
The quirkiness of the band intruding cinematically here and there on the second part, along with the use of music or the charming, fleeting delineation of the animal profiles on the clouds, testify to Gomes following the steps of Anderson; to what purpose or tenor, apart from some kind of academic camp ("her harmless, soft bipolar disorder" snaps when heard), or the occasional charm (I especially, really liked and appreciated the "monkey business" dream early on the film but the film fails to deliver after the double-entendres implied there), I can not tell. It just feels random rather improvisatory and the cinematography, its posing and sequences, if it scores once, then misfires thrice.
I am also someone that finds voice-over the easy way out, unless when used in manner like say Godard or Marker does, and that means part of the stroke, rather than part of a misty crutch. (When at the end we learn that there in Mario's murder lies the beginning of the war, the film, being overall finicky, cannot have this as camp or sly, but is actually rather lame - those who swoon in a post-post-colonialist way or whatever are out of their depths.)
Carlotto Cotta was by far the most powerful presence in the film his cheeky, soulful and sexy gaze anchor the film whenever he is on screen, yet he can not possibly structure the affair, a really missed one.